


Knife Games

by presidentbees



Series: Arcane Distillery [1]
Category: Arcane Distillery, Original Work
Genre: Gambling, Goretober 2018, Knives, Original Fiction, mild body horror, the knife game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-12-26 10:23:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18281126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/presidentbees/pseuds/presidentbees
Summary: “Have you ever made a saint’s deal before?” Andres asked.“Nope.”Andres grinned, unable to hold back her excitement. She couldn’t have gotten more lucky if she had set it up herself — actually, if she had set it up herself, it probably would have found a way to go wrong. Better to leave this kind of thing up to fate.“Alright, I’ll teach you how this goes then.” Andres brought the knife back out, carefully spreading the fingers of her left hand in demonstration.Reuploaded from the Arcane Distillery short story collection





	Knife Games

tw: knives. mentions of drinking / mild intoxication. ~~not actually following through with the prompt well~~

* * *

Andres flourished the paring knife that she had pinched from behind the bar. Fluorescent lights pulsed around her, throwing sparkles off of her gaudy, 20’s flapper costume. She knew it was grossly historically inaccurate — the jeweled veil and gloves were both from the mid 30’s, and her gown only barely passed as a flappers dress — but it made her feel pretty. And it had pockets. 

“Come on,” she said, having to shout over the pounding music. “It doesn’t even hurt if you stab yourself.” 

The man sitting across from Andres fiddled with his diamond cufflinks — a nervous tic that she had picked up on — as he eyed the knife. His short hair was carefully mused back in a way that made it look like he just rolled out of bed, but probably took him an hour to perfectly achieve. He was wearing makeup — the bright, glittery highlighter almost distracting Andres from the dark bruises that were visible from underneath his dark sunglasses.

He was dressed as a sexy magician, complete with white gloves and a top hat. His white shirt was unbuttoned to show a flat, glitter covered chest, and his blazer hugged him just a little too tightly to be appropriate for a work setting. His ‘magic wand’ — a $2 plastic prop from the Halloween store — had rolled to the side of the table, next to his empty drink glasses. 

Andres saw the man’s mouth move as he let out a short laugh. The sound was completely swallowed up by the busy club. “Sure. I don’t see why not.” 

Grinning, Andres held out one gloved hand to shake. He hesitated, then reached out to take her hand in return. “I’m Saint Osmond, but call me Saint Oz.” 

“I’m Andres.” She tapped the paring knife against her left hand, feeling the reverberation of metal against metal. “So, my terms are that—”

“I want to know though, how’d you get into this?” St. Oz interrupted her. 

Andres gritted her teeth, forcing out an easy smile. “What do you mean ‘this’? Parties? It’s easy. My ex knows a guy who runs these, and I don’t think he’s gotten the hint that—” 

“I was more talking about the whole ‘Saints’ thing.” St. Oz raised his hand, drawing the attention of one of the masked waiters that were walking around with drinks. Quickly, a purple and green jester made their way toward them, the bells on its mask jingling as it pranced.

Andres concealed the knife under one hand and shook her head as the jester tried to offer her a drink — “No thanks, I’m fine.”

The jester tilted its head questioningly at her, and Andres tried to shout again, but it held up one finger in a playful _‘shuh’_ motion her as it put down a drink in front of her. The strobing lights made it impossible to tell the drink’s original color, but it effervesced slightly, and the rim of the glass had been dipped in black salt. 

“I don’t—” Andres began to protest, then shut her mouth and smiled patronizingly at the jester, giving it a thumbs up. “Thanks.” 

Jingling the bells on its mask, the jester melted back into the throng of people as it went to service other tables. Watching it go, it dawned on Andres that despite the club being loud enough that she could barely hear St. Oz talking to her from across the table, she could clearly hear the jester’s bells as it walked away. 

_‘Huh. I don’t like that,’_ Andres thought to herself.

Andres turned back to St. Oz, watching as he drained the last of his drink. He slammed the glass on the table loudly, like he was a character from an animated movie — it was painfully obvious that he didn’t do this often. 

“So, back to business. What are your terms? What are you willing to lose?“ 

“Hm. Truthfully, I hadn’t thought this far— can I have your drink?” St. Oz was already reaching across the table to take Andres’ glass before she could agree. He sipped at this one a little more slowly. 

“Have you ever made a saint’s deal before?” Andres asked.

“Nope.” 

Andres grinned, unable to hold back her excitement. She couldn’t have gotten more lucky if she had set it up herself — actually, if she had set it up herself, it probably would have found a way to go wrong. Better to leave this kind of thing up to fate. 

“Alright, I’ll teach you how this goes then.” Andres brought the knife back out, carefully spreading the fingers of her left hand in demonstration. "Once you've got a good pace, you can add in the rest of the song — it's not required, but it adds to the fun."

Slowly, Andres began to stab the spaces between her fingers, making sure that the blade caught the light as she brought it down. Once she had completed a few passes — going from her pinky finger to her thumb, then back again — Andres began to pick up the pace.

“Oh, I have all my fingers. The knife goes chop chop chop. If I miss the spaces in-between my fingers will come off,” Andres hummed the lyrics to herself as she continued to keep pace. She mixed up the pattern — alternating between stabbing between close to her hand, to stabbing closer to her fingertips in a zig-zag pattern. 

“—And if I hit my fingers, the blood will soon come out. But all the same I play this game ‘cause that's what it's all about.”

St. Oz’s shades had slipped down his face slightly as he watched the knife dart between Andres’ fingers. His diamond eyes sparkled in the stroke lights. Andres saw that he didn’t have any pupils — it was if somebody had removed his original eyes and replaced them with an expertly cut diamond ball. If she looked close enough, she could almost see completely through his eyes and into the back—

The knife snagged on Andres’ glove, cutting through the thin fabric and pinning itself to the table. She blinked, looking away from St. Oz’s eyes and busying herself with working the sharp tip loose. 

“Damn it,” she swore. “You get the idea. That was just a demonstration, so it doesn’t count, but if you stab your hand, then you lose. The person who is able to go the fastest without stabbing themself wins. It’s really simple.” 

She held the knife out to St. Oz. “Have you thought about what you want to bet?”

“I can give you one of my eyes.” St. Oz said, his words coming out loose and easy. “It’s not like I— it’s not like I need them, or anything. I really don’t. It’s fine since it’ll grow back.” 

St. Oz spread one of his hands on the table, carefully stabbing between his fingers as practice — Andres watched, delighted as she saw the knife come close to nicking his hand on several occasions. Even as a partially-dead, magical being, St. Oz wasn’t exempt from getting drunk. 

“Alright, I see your bet and I’ll raise it to. . . one pint of blood.Type O+ if you need that information too.” 

St. Oz wrinkled his nose. “What would I do with a pint of blood?” 

“Drink it? Sell it? Put it in water balloons to pelt trick-or-treaters? I honestly don’t have any idea, but it’s always in high demand when making deals.”

Shaking his head, St. Oz put the knife to the side and focused on Andres. “Give me something else.” 

“How about a single chandelier style earring from the 1950’s? It’s genuine crystal.” 

“I don’t have my ears pierced.” 

“Do you like music? I’ve got a music box that plays ‘Au Clair De La Lune’, but you have to wiggle the key just right to get it to play.” 

“Not really my thing.” 

“ _Two_ pints of blood?” 

St. Oz winced, running a hand through his hair. “Actually, on second thought, I’m not really sure I want to do—” 

“An eye for an eye,” Andres interrupted. “A fair trade. Maybe even more because my eye won’t grow back.” 

St. Oz’s eyes literally lit up at the sound of that. Two, bright lights shone from behind his shades as he beamed at her. “Absolutely, yes.” 

_‘Hell,'_ Andres thought to herself, _'If I knew that was what got him excited, I would have offered sooner.’_

Smiling, Andres extended her hand. “Alright, so Saint Osmond, do we have a deal?” 

— — — — —

Andres whistled tunelessly as she cleaned the glass case in the antique shop where she worked. It had been a slow day, and Andres took her time to make sure that the glass was crystal clear as she surveyed the antiques that needed to be protected. 

There was the tiara which — according to the paperwork that the buyer had — once belonged to an actual princess in the 1800’s, which was seated next to a music box which would play “The Emperor Waltz” as a mechanical forest setting moved in time. There were watches and earring sets laid out on velvet cushions, along with the newest item that Andres had brought in. 

Sitting on a new, velvet cushion was a diamond that had been cut in just the right way so it was a perfect circle.

**Author's Note:**

> I originally had this for Goretober 2018, but I dropped the ball pretty early. Still, it fits with Andres' canon story ~~except the part where she can see in color, but I'll mark this up to being an earlier version of Andres~~ and so into the drabble list it goes. 
> 
> If you want to learn more about Andres, you can learn more about her on her [toyhou.se](https://toyhou.se/1780532.andres-daven). Saint Osmond doesn't have his own character profile (yet), but you can read about the other Saints on [toyhou.se](https://toyhou.se/presidentbees/characters/folder:524537)toyhou.se as well.


End file.
